Help - Dell Inspiron 8600 Digi002r

[Matt L]

Hi All,

If anyone can offer any help I'd appreciate it!

I have a digi 002r and a dell inspiron 8600. The dell has 1.7ghz processor, 512mb memory and a 60gig HD (not 7200 rpm). Its running XPhome and pro tools 6.4. The audio drive is USB2 120gig (oxford chipset). I'm using the onboard 4pin firewire.

I have two problems - first one is noise - everytime I access the hard drive or move the mouse or the screen redraws I can hear it on the headphone out of the 002. Whilst irritating, this can be fixed using a DI box - its some kind of earth loop I guess.

The biggest problem is recording - I can load a session from a TDM system and play back 32 tracks with no problem. I just can't record - as soon as I record enable on a track the system hangs for about 2 minutes - its almost completely unusable. I get operating sytem held of too long messages etc etc. I typicaly use a buffer of 512 - but I thought I would be able to use less with the inspiron 8600. I thought I would be able to record on 32 tracks simulataeously! HELP

Does anyone have any advice? Help would be greatly appreciated. I was really looking forward to playing with this setup!

Thanks guys. If I need to provide more info, just ask.

[da BaSsTaRd!]

I can load a session from a TDM system and play back 32 tracks with no problem. I just can't record - as soon as I record enable on a track the system hangs for about 2 minutes - its almost completely unusable. I get operating sytem held of too long messages etc etc. I typicaly use a buffer of 512 - but I thought I would be able to use less with the inspiron 8600.

inspiron or perspiron???

one thing you can try is go into preferences and chage the maximum recording time from open ended to 10 or 15 minutes. thats a major cause of recording hangs.

interrupt errors are another story. your perspiron is probably one of those "all on board" machines where everything is integrated. not much to do there. you should check your IRQs and see if you can spread out your devices a bit. it will be tough if everything is integrated.

the first thing i would do with that machine is format the hard drive and reinstall a clean copy of windows. get rid of all that dell garbage.

other than that, maybe you should have a look at the sticky thread: best desktops for PTLE and consider upgrading your system...

[Gary H]

Hi

Running Pro Tools LE (002 Rack) on my Inspiron 8600 with no problems. I had to remove everything that was not required ie Office stuff, virus protection etc. Make sure there are no excessive programs runnning in the background and that there is nothing in your startup menu.

I had the same problem with my 4pin to 6pin firewire cable, then I bought an adapter (4 pin to 6 pin) and used the cable that came with the Digi 002 and had no more problems

Go to the Power Options in the Control Panel and make sure that everything is set to "Always On" and that Hibernation is Off.

It might be very worthwhile doing a complete reformat and reinstalling XP. And make sure you have all the latest system drivers for your Dell.

Cheers

Gary

[Matt L]

Hi - OK - advice is all quite useful - but this is a work machine, so I have to have office installed etc!! Can I set up a dual boot and reinstall a windows OS onto that and would it help?!

Cheers

MattL

[da BaSsTaRd!]

Can I set up a dual boot and reinstall a windows OS onto that and would it help?!

absolutely, but i think if you do a clean install [do not use the dell recovery cd or the dell windows cd] you won't have any problems with a single partition for everything. i don't. but, dual boot would certainly guarantee no problems (as long as your problems aren't hardware related).

[Matt L]

OK - well, I will try doing a dual boot system I think. If that works, I might do a complete clean install! Presumably XP home is OK - any advantage to using XP professional?

Cheers

Matt

[Aussie Scott]

I think the only advantage that XP pro offers is network capabilities - and as you should not be using the network and PT then Home is absolutely fine. Good luck. May the force be with you!

[tele_player]

From the Microsoft site:

It includes all the great features and new visual design of Windows XP Home Edition, plus premier security and privacy features, advanced recovery options, improved ability to connect to large networks, and much more.

There's very little difference, and the networking features in XP Home are completely adequate. The 'Professional' upsell by Microsoft and Dell is pretty funny.

[Matt L]

May the force be with you!

Ahh - the force is strong with this one my friend...

[Matt L]

OK - I've tried quite a few tricks and I think the best one is cutting back the recording time. What bugs me a bit is that when I first installed Pro Tools, I recorded eight tracks simultaneously with no problems for 2 hours!

I also completely re-installed pro tools - that seemed to help a bit too!

Thanks for the help all!